"Take no heed of her...She reads a lot of books."
~Jasper Fforde


Friday, November 4, 2011

Tudor Literature

I was looking ahead on my syllabus for Tudor Literature, and was thrilled to see that we'll be finishing up the semester with William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night!  That's my favorite of his plays!  Now, this will be the second time I read this play for a college course (the first time was last year), and I've always thought it would be funny to come to class wearing the one identifying piece of clothing of one of the characters (ie. a bowler hat if reading Waiting for Godot; a skull if reading Hamlet, a mask if The Phantom of the Opera, or perhaps carry around a badly burned manuscript if reading Hedda Gabbler).  In Twelfth Night, the big thing is Malvolio's yellow stockings.

Malvolio is a very melancholy character, considered by the others to be a complete stick-in the mud.  So, Sir Toby, Sir Andrew, and Maria all decide it would be really funny to send him letters and let him think they are from Oliva, the girl he likes (who happens to be his employer), and make him do stupid things, like smile all the time (to the point where it is creepy), and to wear yellow, cross-gartered stockings, which Oliva personally thinks is a horrid fashion statement.

I thought it would be fun to just come to class dressed in yellow stockings.  My professor is really cool, and I know she'd find the whole thing to be very funny.  Do you think I should do it?  It's a small class, so I don't have much to worry about.  I'd just get to class early, while the room is still dark, go to the back corner, slip off my pants (because I'm not going to walk around campus in yellow tights) and I'd have shorts or cropped pants and the yellow tights on underneath.  Then, I'd just have to act a bit like Malvolio.  I think it would be really funny.  But, tell me what you think first!  In case you weren't sure, this is sort of what it would look like.


Credit goes to Lydianime, who posted this picture on her DeviantArt page :)


5 comments:

  1. do i!t do i!t do it! It sounds hilarious!

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  2. lol, all I can think of is the time I played all the other characters while you were memorizing your lines for this play, and there was a weird voice for each one of them...def wear the yellow stockings, and don't you dare cover them up, be proud of your fashion statement!! BTW, I found an adorable new fashion statement for you today...you don't get to see till after I come back, but I just HAD to get it...you'll love it :D

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  3. Haha; I'm glad you guys are so excited about this! I'm going home this weekend, and I'll be sure to look for some stuff.

    Gaby,
    I'm rather curious now as to what you've found....If I can't see it until you get back, could you at least give me a hint? :P

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  4. But, but...hints will be really hard to give without giving it away ;) Besides, it's counting as a christmas present, so you can't know about it right now anyway :D

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  5. Lol! Okay, okay :)

    And I'll be sure to send pictures if I actually pull off the costume, as it were. ;)

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